EDUCATE webinar to examine the effects of Covid lockdown on SEND and vulnerable children

A panel of experts led by former Schools Minister, Lord Jim Knight, is to discuss the school lockdown experience of children with special needs and disabilities (SEND) in the latest webinar being hosted by EDUCATE Ventures, on May 27.

The event, part of EDUCATE’s Shock to the System series, will look at how Covid school lockdowns have affected families with vulnerable children, and the extent to which they were able to continue their education while schools were closed to a majority of pupils.

There are about a million pupils in UK schools who have learning difficulties or disabilities and recent studies suggest that children with SEND had a mixed experience of the lockdown. Some families felt abandoned without any support or help, while the parents of others reported that their children had thrived without the pressures of attending school.

Where children had complex conditions that required care at home and specialist assistance, this became harder to access as services were cut back or unavailable during the lockdown. Youngsters with compromised immune systems were forced to shield for months on end.

Dame Christine Lenehan, director of the Council for Disabled Children, said in one report that some children ended up “incarcerated” in their homes. “There are some who barely had any formal education.”

Confirmed speakers at the webinar include Professor Julia Carroll, Centre for Global Learning, Coventry University, Dr Helen Ross, Independent Researcher/Founder, Helen’s Place Education Consultancy, Pete Wharmby, Autistic Teacher/Speaker, (Patreon), (Twitter) and Lorraine Petersen, Educational Consultant, LPEC and a former chief executive of the National Association for Special Educational Needs. Further participants will be announced in due course.

The webinar will consider what support was available from schools and other agencies to assist children with SEND and how well equipped pupils were to access learning. It will look at the extend to which they were able to use technology and what can be done in the future to improve the education experience for children and families.

Professor Rose Luckin, Director and Founder of EDUCATE, said: “Families of children with SEND were among the worst affected during the pandemic, with many services unavailable or withdrawn.

“However, we also need to listen those for whom not being at school was a blessing; whose parents said that they had thrived and for whom the anxiety of attending school had been lifted. We need to find out from both of these groups — and from those whose experience was somewhere in-between — what can be done to make learning better, both in school and in the event of future lockdowns.”

Register for the event here.